


Prices Infinitesimal, Infinite

by khooliha



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-15
Updated: 2016-04-15
Packaged: 2018-06-02 07:55:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6558421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/khooliha/pseuds/khooliha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>See you out there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prices Infinitesimal, Infinite

_There will be a price_ they said, but he barely heard them. Prices didn’t matter, not really. Not now. 

He gave his captain the gift, the key to avoiding a frankly genocidal sentence. He knew the Continuum thought it was a waste, otherwise they wouldn’t have allowed it, but what did they know of humanity? What did they know of his ship, of his captain? _Even if they figure it out, they will not do what they must._ He loved it when they were wrong. 

Because they were, of course, because Picard would always do what he must. Even if the Continuum had sentenced this one ship to death to save all of humanity Q would have saved the species. Picard really had been a bad influence. So what greater cost could they extract from him? 

In the end he had made a promise he couldn’t keep. “See you out there,” he said, more for the look on his captain’s face than anything else. He would never see humans again, or any other being, sentient or not. 

_The price is to stay here, to roam no more. The Continuum has no place in the world of lesser beings._

That was all beings and it was too much, but it was also a minor price to pay. He vowed compliance with a rarely seen seriousness and wondered how he got to this point. He’d have plenty of time to figure it out when this was over, when he was trapped within the Continuum. 

Trapped. Existence had gotten strange. 

He thought a lot of his captain, and even felt a pang for the deep space station which had promised so much intrigue, so many opportunities. But as he rode at his captain’s side into the anomaly and the Continuum’s whole plan had unraveled he knew it was worth it. 

“See you out there.” 

It was strange how time dilated, how a life that was millennia long skipped along like a stone across a lake surface, but a handful of years could stretch into actual eternity, each moment torture because there was nothing. Nothing more to say or do and he had chosen it, which was the worst part. Be a good little soldier, he told himself once every few minutes, a mantra fully drained of meaning within days. He lived entirely in the moment, too worried to revisit his lifetime of memories, in case they frayed. 

One day, that was exactly the same as every other day, a ripple travelled through the Continuum. _Q has escaped_ passed from voice to voice and he tried to contain his excitement. Someone was free. 

_Q._

They were speaking to him, a first since he had paid his price. “Yes?” What was this? Something like a memory, or a dream. No, not quite. He had spoken. A voice was something he could have, something he did have. A form, one he settled into on instinct, was something he could have. The form was human and he had never quite figured out how he had gotten here. They would likely punish him for it. 

_Go. Bring Q back. Do not let him disrupt the Continuum._

And suddenly he was elsewhere, out in the vacuum of space. He could feel things again, the cold of the void and the light of the stars and for one moment he allowed himself to smile, to think he was free again. But he had a job to do and doubtless the Continuum was watching. With his luck the rogue Q would be hiding on some lifeless rock, or in some anomaly. Nowhere near anything alive – the Continuum wouldn’t want to endanger his rehabilitation after all, not when it was going so well. Stay serious. Don’t risk further punishment. He was trying, but he still reached out into the tail of a comet as he passed it, still killed a little time in a nebula, happy all the way through to be experiencing something even remotely new. The universe seemed reborn. 

The job. Keep your mind on the job. Maybe if he did a good job they’d loosen the collar just a little. 

He found the escaped Q in an instant and went there with a self-indulgent snap of his fingers. It wasn’t what he had expected, a moon with no atmosphere, or a comet. No, he was inside a ship, one that screamed Starfleet even in an impossible quadrant of space. And there was a captain who he didn’t recognize, but she had a fire in her that he definitely did. He thought of the price he paid with every single moment. For the first time since he had said his goodbye he felt like maybe he was done paying. Oh, not by the Continuum’s measure, certainly not, but that didn’t change the glee that was building up inside of him. He tried to reach for his mantra, but it was drowned out completely by the rush of possibilities in his brain. 

_See you out there._ Maybe he’d still get that chance. 

So even though the Continuum had its eye on him and the captain in front of him was scowling in a way he couldn’t help but feel nostalgic about, he smiled. It was immensely gratifying to know he could still feel alive. Whatever happened, this was worth it. Yes, this was going to be _fun._

**Author's Note:**

> I'm convinced something like this is why Q only showed up on Deep Space Nine that one time.


End file.
